Africa: Time for a More Sustainable Global Food System

BULAWAYO (IPS Africa) - It is vitally important that governments and civil society organisations start transitioning to a more sustainable global food system in order to achieve lasting development.
The current global food system is unsustainable and does not allow for farmers to live lives of dignity, says Sameer Dossani, ActionAid International advocacy coordinator. He was speaking ahead of his organisation's participation in the upcoming Rio+20 summit, otherwise known as the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, which takes place from Jun. 20 to 22 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

ActionAid International will be one of up to 50,000 participants, including business executives and civil society representatives, and over 135 heads of state and government that will be present.

"A sustainable global food system prioritises maximising production through a reliance on inputs such as chemical fertilisers and pesticides. When a farmer cannot afford the costs related to these inputs, she is pushed aside and her land is generally bought by bigger farmers or corporations," Dossani says.
He says that a more sustainable approach to agriculture would focus on the diversity and knowledge that already exists, while also welcoming low cost, new technologies to improve production. "ActionAid considers sustainable agriculture to be an approach derived from the recognition of the human right to food. It is a way of life based on self-reliant and agro-ecological systems, which encompass all forms of livelihoods for smallholder farmers, farm workers, landless people, pastoralists, livestock farmers, fisheries and hunter-gatherer societies," he says.

Dossani says that since the U.N. adopted Agenda 21, an action plan for sustainable development, at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, some governments have made considerable progress in curbing least-sustainable practices.

While Dossani argues that a shift towards sustainable development is inevitable, he adds that upholding the status quo on these matters is no longer an option. Excerpts of the interview follow:

Is the concept of sustainable development working? Twenty years on since Rio we are still talking about it.
It's true that some actors, perhaps especially the UNFCCC (the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change), seem to be putting a lot of money and time into processes that aren't going anywhere. We would certainly question the efficiency of these processes and call on the international community to resolve to address these issues in a more cost-effective manner.
However, sustainable development and related issues being discussed at Rio are of vital importance to communities, and maintaining the status quo is not an option. A shift towards sustainable development is inevitable. Whether the change towards sustainability is strategically planned and gradual, or whether that change comes as a result of economic crises and increasing climate disasters is a question for all of us to decide.

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